Whitmarsh doesn't like it, Petrov says passing is impossible (which he used to his advantage this year, of course).

Here is the track plan...

What should be done?

Firstly I'd suggest straightening out the long straights between T7/8 and T10/11. As it stands the cars natural line is across the middle and it restricts the space to make a move. I believe they can do this by just adjusting the track area rather than demolishing any hotels!

T7 is a heavy traction zone and creates a big gap between the cars. I don't believe there is the space to open it out due to the feature grandstand, but they could but a high-speed kink in a few hundred yards later, in the vein of Ascari at Monza. It would still leave a long straight, and the cars would have got over their traction issues.

The street-grid section and first sector I would leave alone, I quite like the demands they put on the rhythm of the driver.

How much did this track cost again? £800m? And they can't use all the facilities for the sport they most covet?

Atrocious.

Unfortunately for those of us that believe that F1 should be about racing, Abu Dhabi have invested in F1 as a spectacle... so, the proximity of the public to the track (T7, Yas Marina Hotel, viewing galleries over the pitlane) is more important than the layout of the track.

I believe they can tweak the track a little to make proper use of those long straights as overtaking zones without compromising their marketing plans...

There's not much you can do about the marina/hotel section and there's not much you can do about the three chicanes because the run off and stands won't allow for anything else.

So it's fundamentally a flawed design with no realistic room for improvement or changes.

I guess when they say Monaco of the Middle East they really meant it, the thing is people accept that Monaco is difficult to overtake but Monaco has so much more going for it than just how good it is for overtaking (extremely tight, very close walls, frantic driving, unique corners and features, elevation change, history, architecture)

At least it won't be the final race of 2011, hopefully we will have a similar WDC situation for Brazil 2011 as we had for Abu Dhabi 2010. I think people will just have to chalk up that Abu Dhabi is a pole position/processional racetrack. This is why they should just be thrown somewhere in the middle of the season in obscurity instead of being highly publicised openers and closures.

Here is my idea to change the circuit layout to make for a more enjoying race, greater challenge for the drivers and hopefully more overtaking.

Here is the current layout: (Thank you Bridgestone)

Now... I have made changes in Blue that I would like to see, if the existing direction is to be kept. I hae numbered them to explain my thoughts:

Change No. 1: Quite simple really. I have opened up the radius of the corner and made it MUCH wider. This offers a defensive line which is slightly slower out of the corner, or a much later wider turn in for a faster exit. Obviously the car running behind has to throw an attempt to dive inside, to get the car ahead to cover, then sweep back to the right to try and get that jump onto the straight. If the track is wide enough here, it is possible, and yet keeps action close the the grandstands and offers more chance of overtakes even into the corner. Those taking the wide line and not paying attention, might just get nailed by Banzai late brakers like Koby, who may then lose the place again on the straight and run into the fast S chicane due to poor exit speed of the first hairpin.

Change No. 2: Think Silverstone and Beckets'ish' or Turkey. Basically I would have the cars coming into again a wider turn, faster than present, which allows for greater chances of overshoots, thus allowing someone to dive inside...OR alternatively...hang back a tad as the car ahead overshoots/brakes really late and then get a faster run through into the corner, however go too fast into this and the tightening final part of the S shaped chicane will punish you as it will be negative camber and this will destroy your exit and speed onto the straight. Get it right and again you fly out of the corner onto the next long straight with a chance of overtake again at the end.

Change No. 3: The ever tightening corner!!! Again the fact that entry is high speed, will truly sort the men from the boys, in terms of balance of the car breaking and turning tighter. Leave it too late and you hit the barrier harder than Webber did. Get it just right and as a driver you get that great sensation of maxing a corner on entry, but this is one for the truly brave.

Anyway...these would be my changes to the circuit and I am pretty confident that there would be more overtaking as a result.

They need a tricky corner leading onto the straight, a corner were it is possible to lose a lot of exit speed with a slight mistake. Like the last real corner in Brazil. A hairpin leading to a straight is easy to defend, given that the leading car is always going to get a lot sooner on the throttle. Almost impossible to get a run out of that hairpin, unless you can force the car ahead to take a defensive line. But that can not happen here because of the chicane just before.

A straight run from the fast esses into a tricky corner leading onto the straight would work better.

I dont think it needs that many modifications to make it an excellent circuit for overtaking.

Removing turns 5 & 6 and taking a straight line to increase the braking zone would help (and if they can have a braking zone like that at Canada than can in Abu Dhabi too) and then remove the chicane at 8/9 and replace with a corner of a similar speed to turn 1 would create more opportunity for a driver with better tyres to close on the car in front and overtake into turn 11.

I like the third sector and think they have got that just about right, and it forces set-up compromises which is never bad.

I dont think it needs that many modifications to make it an excellent circuit for overtaking.

Removing turns 5 & 6 and taking a straight line to increase the braking zone would help (and if they can have a braking zone like that at Canada than can in Abu Dhabi too) and then remove the chicane at 8/9 and replace with a corner of a similar speed to turn 1 would create more opportunity for a driver with better tyres to close on the car in front and overtake into turn 11.

I like the third sector and think they have got that just about right, and it forces set-up compromises which is never bad.

The first thing I did was reverse the direction and make it a crossover. Hopefully, the first corners will be very fast; we haven't really got any circuits where the first corner is high speed. The circuit follows the back half fairly accurately, though I modified the bottom corner (the new turn four) to keep the overtaking opportunity into the corner, but hopefully allow the cars to pick up some speed throuh the new turns six and seven. I didn't really know what to do with the next bit, but the presence of the hotel really limits possibilities, so I just ran it under the hotel and tried to reconfigure it to be something a little more interesting than a pair of ninety-degree bends. I figure the circuit would then go through either a tunnel under or a bridge over itself, then loop around behind the grandstands. The only reason this is possible is because the existing run-off goes under the grandstands, so it becomes part of the course. Then it's down the long back straight into the hairpin, but not through the chicane. The rest of the lap follows as normal, but in reverse. I decided to add an extra weave to the chicane over the hill so make life a little more difficult for the drivers.

The problem is the hairpin itself, the acceleration out of it. I won't bring any visualization on the table, but I think the best way to get rid of the problem there, is to swap the chicane to the other side.

One problem is that there is only one fast line trough the slow corners. Compare that for example to the first corner of interlagos, you can take many different approaches without losing half a second.

Another option is to have more medium speed corners. In slow corner it does not help to follow close behind because, the car in front will always start accelerating much earlier and enjoy a big gap at the end of the straight.

This year races have been already much better thanks to the refuelling ban. Anyway, I don't think overtaking should be too easy. It should still be possible, at least with some risk. Alonso was not taking any.

Agree that the lack of runoff at T7 means they cannot run F1 straight to the hairpin (missing the chicane) in the current config. However there is clearly a loop - marked below in red - which (whilst fugly to the extreme) surely would enable F1 to miss out the T5&6 chicane which ruins the chance for cars to follow closely onto the long straight, let alone pass under braking.

This would allow the cars to enter the hairpin without negotiating the chicane, but would obviously mean T7 would not be a huge deceleration zone, so perhaps less passing, but not as severe a traction problem on the exit?

1 - get ride of the chincane, make it a simple hairpin before the long straight. The reasoning behind that it to create an overtaking point at the hairpin itself and down the straight, since drivers taking aggressive and defensive moves would also have different exit speeds and one will inevitably compromise his speed down the straight (unless he has virtually no wing on his set up).2 - transform the chincane after the long back straight into a medium/quick left right flick, sort of like the first corner at Melbourne. It will remain a long and heavy enough braking zone, but it will also be fast enough to avoid the slingshot effect down the next straight.3 - straighten the run from corner 11 to 14. Eliminating the chincane will allow drivers to try different entry and exit lines and forcing them to find a compromise when defending or attacking.

And then all these changes together would make the track faster and set up less obvious towards highdownforce and cornering. Suddenly they drivers would also have to worry about overtaking and defending. Sector 3 of the track would become more difficult and tricky once they take some wing off to have enough speed through sectors 1 and 2. That might even lead into more mistakes in the slower sections and some possible overtaking moves as well. Not to mention the integration between hotel and circuit would remain untouched and the cirucit would lose none of its character and appeal. Everyone wins.

Pretty epic, the people at the grandstand that has the track go under would get an awesome view. Until webber decides to be a pilot.

Ah, but that's the beauty of it - with my proposal, the cars would be going down the back straight in the opposite direction to which they currently do, so the cars wouldn't be able to build up enough speed coming out of the previous corner to launch themselves airborne.

A) Open out the hairpin and remove the stupid chicane before it. Doing it this way means they don't have to change the grandstand right away. The wider and slightely opening hairpins should help cars leave in closer formation. In future they could move the stands closer with the run-off underneath if they really feel the need to have the crowd nice and close.

B)Use the medium speed chicane along this straight. Necessary to slow the cars because otherwise it would be too long a run from one end of the circuit to the other (current turns 7-11), but at least it's a faster chicane than the current one. It would just be more exciting.

C) Remove the painful chicane at T8-9 and have the long run from the new chicane to what is now T11. Have it smoothly curving round the final turn so run-off there isn't compromised. Later they can fix the stands as the T8 run-off would not be needed. Having the main straight on a slight curve isn't a problem at all. It works perfectly well at Interlagos.

D) I'm thinking the whole complex here should be replaced with a fast-medium speed double apex corner, allowing multiple lines on the way in. I have no idea why they put a chicane after T11. That makes no sense at all. Hopefully you'd get some overtaking into this exciting corner. (Maybe it could have a slight amount of banking.) Obviously the support pit lane exit would have to be modified. I picture it being something like a cross between Spoon at Suzuka and the Double Droite du Beausset at Paul Ricard.

I'm fine with leaving the bit under the hotel, as it seems to be mistake generator, only I would use gravel traps there, as the speeds are low enough that it will be safe and it will actually punish drivers who make a mistake.

they should do something to turn 7.... maybe make the hairpin wider. Basically something that means there isnt only one ideal line b4 entering the long straight. e.g. the corner b4 the China straight.

turn 8, turn 9 n turn 10, can be scrapped and converted into one or two high speed corners... if not possible, they could just make it totally flat out. connect the two straights into one incredible long straight, that will really mess with car setup n definitely increase overtaking.

on paper, it shouldnt be hard to increase overtaking on that track at all.

I suspect that if the T8-9 complex were eliminated in favour of a slowly arcing straight then the circuit would fall foul of the rule that limits the maximum length of a straight to something like 1500 metres (which is why Le Mans had to put chicanes on the Mulsanne Straight).

Unfortunately for those of us that believe that F1 should be about racing, Abu Dhabi have invested in F1 as a spectacle... so, the proximity of the public to the track (T7, Yas Marina Hotel, viewing galleries over the pitlane) is more important than the layout of the track.

They probably read one of those "Tilke tracks are horrible because they stick the fans behind massive runoff areas, miles away from the cars" threads

I suspect that if the T8-9 complex were eliminated in favour of a slowly arcing straight then the circuit would fall foul of the rule that limits the maximum length of a straight to something like 1500 metres (which is why Le Mans had to put chicanes on the Mulsanne Straight).

I'm not knowledgeable enough to make exact track change comments, but something clearly needs to be done to add even just a single, epic overtaking point. How hard can it be, really? I know current F1 cars are among the worst ever for overtaking, but other tracks don't suffer nearly as much.

The venue looks stunning, the dusk-night transition is nice, the stands are full, the facilities are amazing, and it really could be F1's second crown jewel of glitz and glamour after Monaco. It just suffers the same problem as Monaco sadly, which is difficulty of overtaking. And it doesn't have the high risk of chaos element that makes Monaco interesting. Overtaking shouldn't be easy in F1, but not almost impossible; seeing Alonso stuck behind Petrov the whole race, while amusing for those who aren't his fans, is a perfect illustration of what's wrong with this circuit.

All this talk does make me think that Sam Michael was on to something when he blamed circuits for overtaking being hard. P.S. I believe it is not quite that black and white and that the insane amount of aerodynamic effects streaming off the cars (causing the infamous "dirty air") are just as culpable.

But given that we see overtaking at

Albert Park
Sepang
China (perhaps weather related in recent seasons)
Istanbul
Montreal
Hockenheim (normally, not so much this year for some reason)
Spa
Monza
Korea
and
Interlagos

All this talk does make me think that Sam Michael was on to something when he blamed circuits for overtaking being hard. P.S. I believe it is not quite that black and white and that the insane amount of aerodynamic effects streaming off the cars (causing the infamous "dirty air") are just as culpable.

But given that we see overtaking at

Albert ParkSepangChina (perhaps weather related in recent seasons)IstanbulMontrealHockenheim (normally, not so much this year for some reason)SpaMonzaKoreaand Interlagos

All this talk does make me think that Sam Michael was on to something when he blamed circuits for overtaking being hard. P.S. I believe it is not quite that black and white and that the insane amount of aerodynamic effects streaming off the cars (causing the infamous "dirty air") are just as culpable.

But given that we see overtaking at

Albert ParkSepangChina (perhaps weather related in recent seasons)IstanbulMontrealHockenheim (normally, not so much this year for some reason)SpaMonzaKoreaand Interlagos

A) Open out the hairpin and remove the stupid chicane before it. Doing it this way means they don't have to change the grandstand right away. The wider and slightely opening hairpins should help cars leave in closer formation. In future they could move the stands closer with the run-off underneath if they really feel the need to have the crowd nice and close.

B)Use the medium speed chicane along this straight. Necessary to slow the cars because otherwise it would be too long a run from one end of the circuit to the other (current turns 7-11), but at least it's a faster chicane than the current one. It would just be more exciting.

C) Remove the painful chicane at T8-9 and have the long run from the new chicane to what is now T11. Have it smoothly curving round the final turn so run-off there isn't compromised. Later they can fix the stands as the T8 run-off would not be needed. Having the main straight on a slight curve isn't a problem at all. It works perfectly well at Interlagos.

D) I'm thinking the whole complex here should be replaced with a fast-medium speed double apex corner, allowing multiple lines on the way in. I have no idea why they put a chicane after T11. That makes no sense at all. Hopefully you'd get some overtaking into this exciting corner. (Maybe it could have a slight amount of banking.) Obviously the support pit lane exit would have to be modified. I picture it being something like a cross between Spoon at Suzuka and the Double Droite du Beausset at Paul Ricard.

I'm fine with leaving the bit under the hotel, as it seems to be mistake generator, only I would use gravel traps there, as the speeds are low enough that it will be safe and it will actually punish drivers who make a mistake.